


To Think, To Enjoy, To Love

by themillersdaughtersmistress



Category: Black Sails
Genre: Amnesia, Amnesiac Miranda, Eventual Happy Ending, Misunderstandings, Multi, Pining, Possible Extreme Medical and Historical Inaccuracy for the Sake of Fic, You know all the classic fanfic tropes
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-04-14
Updated: 2017-04-19
Packaged: 2018-10-18 16:58:31
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,230
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10621191
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/themillersdaughtersmistress/pseuds/themillersdaughtersmistress
Summary: "The man, tall and blond, was turned away from her, bent down to sort through a crate of their most recent shipments. “Yes, of course, Miss Hattery,” he said, leaning up and turning around with a smile that made Miranda’s heart flutter. “It’s lovely to meet—” He stopped, taking in Miranda fully, his jaw actually dropping.Miranda frowned. “Is there something the matter, Mister Barlow?”Or, Miranda lives through Charlestown, but has amnesia from head trauma. Five years later, she, Thomas, and James all end up in Boston.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you first and foremost to @bean-about-townn (tumblr) for agreeing to beta this; and thank you to DreamingPagan/@flintsredhair (tumblr) for letting me take their ideas of amnesiac!miranda and run with it! This is my first work in this fandom, and as such, feedback is extremely welcome. Hope y'all enjoy!

**~The Outskirts of Charlestown, 1715~**

She was drifting. She had been for a while, and wasn’t sure what her mind had done before that. She wasn’t sure of anything in her surroundings. It was dark, even when she could find the energy to open her eyes, and her ears were ringing. She could feel her body being jerked around, the motion repetitive, as if she were in a carriage. It was odd; why wasn’t she back on the ship?

 _What ship_?

What ship, indeed. She couldn’t remember anything about this supposed ship other than that it didn’t belong to them.

 _Them? Who’s them_?

She couldn’t remember that, either. In fact, she couldn’t seem to remember her own name. Panic started to set in—a dark, distant storm, making its way through the fuzziness of her brain. The more she tried to grasp at any solid part of her mind, the more it slipped away. Whatever form of confinement she was in started to close in even more, and the air seemed to leave it. Sluggishly, with what energy she had, she started to struggle.

She must have made some noise, because in the next moment, she could hear someone shifting beside her prison ( _A coffin. Why was she in a coffin?_ ). “Please stay calm, Lady Miranda,” they said. It sounded like a young girl. “We are almost safe, I promise.”

 _Lady Miranda_? That must be her, but she had no attachment to the name. Still, she stopped moving, if only because all her energy was now gone. Her body went heavy, and slowly, she faded back into unconsciousness.

**~Boston, 1720~**

The days in summer in the American colonies were blisteringly hot, to Miranda Ashe, but the mornings were always curiously cool. Dawn was her favorite time of day, even though no one—not the sun, and certainly not her niece (up visiting from the Carolinas)—was awake. The only place whose doors were open at this hour were that of Maryse’s, the local bookseller on the very outskirts of the town.

She was a shrewd and cantankerous old woman, with little to no appreciation for the books themselves, only the words. She made Miranda laugh, and was one of the only ones to not mind Miranda’s lack of memory before five years ago. Miranda always helped open up the shop with her—every day except Sunday, when Maryse would drag her to the church—and they would sit and talk about the books that had arrived in the comfortable shade all morning.

Today, though, was different. Maryse had warned her, when they’d been coming back from church yesterday, that she’d taken on a man to help her where Miranda could not. She’d insisted that it wasn’t proper for a lady to do as much as Miranda did, and that they should both have the extra muscle around. Miranda had protested but ultimately agreed, leading to this—the mystery man’s first day.

Miranda cautiously pushed the door open, the bell announcing her entrance. There was nothing out of place from when she’d last been here, save for the fact that Maryse was nowhere to be found. The shop was silent, as it hadn’t been since before Miranda had started helping, and she felt her heartrate spike.

“Maryse?” she called out softly. There was no answer, so Miranda moved further into the shop, closing the door softly behind her. Dust swirled in the shafts of light from the windows as she moved towards the door on the back wall, behind the multitude of shelves. She could hear voices coming faintly from the room it.

“Maryse?” she called again.

The voices cut off abruptly, and the door swung open. Maryse toddled out with as much enthusiasm as an old woman could muster. “There you are, darling, I was beginning to think you’d never get here!” Miranda was perfectly on time, but refrained from mentioning that. Maryse grabbed her arm and started dragging her into the room. “Come meet the lovely gentleman, Mister Barlow! You know I was nervous, taking on a stranger to work based on letters, and more so when he’d written me that he was from the Georgia colonies, but I’d suspect a Lord straight from London couldn’t be politer! His brother was a bit rougher around the edges, but they’re both lovely boys! Mister Barlow, come meet my other employee, Lady Ashe!”

The man, tall and blond, was turned away from her, bent down to sort through a crate of their most recent shipments. “Yes, of course, Miss Hattery,” he said, leaning up and turning around with a smile that made Miranda’s heart flutter. “It’s lovely to meet—” He stopped, taking in Miranda fully, his jaw actually dropping.

Miranda frowned. “Is there something the matter, Mister Barlow?” she asked. He looked at her like a man just come from a desert, and she the first oasis he’d ever seen. _Have we met before_? She squashed the question before it could make it fully out of her mouth. It had taken her too long to learn the answer to that question was always no, and she wasn’t going to started wishing again.

He seemed to shake himself, and his posture and face melted back into that welcoming smile. “No, of course. You just remind me of someone I used to know.” That spike of longing was back, and she shoved it aside more forcefully this time. She held out her hand, and he reached to take it and kiss her knuckles. Something tugged at the back of her mind, but it was gone the moment he straightened back up. “It’s lovely to meet you, Lady Ashe.”


	2. Chapter 2

**~Maryse’s Bookshop~**

“Well that’s wrong, then,” Miranda said firmly, cutting Thomas off. They were in the middle of several stacks of books; Miranda had dragged over a dusty pillow fully past its prime over to sit on, but Thomas was sprawled out on his back on the bare stone floor.

“How so?” he asked. He looked confused but not, Miranda saw with relief, offended. She’d offended many men by cutting them off. It hadn’t bothered her with most men, but Thomas was turning out to very much not fall into the category of ‘most men,’ in the short week since she’d met him.

Miranda plucked the book from his hands, flipping to a page near the back. “Well, it said—ah, here!—here,” she held the book back out for him to see, “if he’s being fully truthful here, then he’s not being noble, he’s being a coward.”

“It’s not noble to let someone grow without you, rather than complicate their lives by trying to reconnect?”

Miranda started shaking her head before he’d even finished his sentence. “It could be; it’s not now. He’s making a decision—they all are—without talking to the person it would affect most!”

Thomas smiled at her. “That _is_ a good point,” he conceded. He sat up, the look he’d had when they’d first met back on his face before he rid himself of it. “You’re not from Boston, originally, are you?”

“And why would you think that?” Miranda demanded. In all their spirited debates—on books, on current events, on the damn weather—she’d managed to avoid the topic of her past. It had to come up at some point, but she’d rather have that point be somewhere in between ‘a year later’ and ‘never.’

“Your accent—it changes from something from here to the southern colonies to west London itself. That, and these colonies are too new to have access to the multitudes you’ve clearly read.”

Miranda huffed. It had been one of the few things she remembered, her love and extensive knowledge of books. A blessing, really, since she’d been useless before that revelation (no matter what Abigail insisted). Now, it might lose her one of the only friends she’d made in five years.

“The flattery is kind,” she began carefully, taking a deep breath. It did nothing to calm her nerves. “But I can’t truthfully answer your question; I have no memory of anything of my life before five years ago.”

Thomas reached out a hand, palm up, and she took it gratefully. His thumb rubbed soothingly at the parts of her hand he could reach. “Did you have no family to tell you of yourself? To help you?”

“My niece,” she answered. “Apparently, we were both in Charlestown when those pirates attacked the city. I don’t have any memory of the attack itself, but I do know that she is the reason I’m alive at all.”

She frowned, realizing Thomas’s hand had gone still in hers. Miranda looked up. Thomas had gone deathly pale, something that looked like horror dawning on his face. “You needn’t look like that. Charlestown was a tragedy, certainly, but I’m perfectly fine aside from my memory, and so is Abigail—” He made a noise in the back of his throat, and she clarified. “My niece.”

The look hadn’t left his face, and Miranda was reminded of the first time they met. “Charlestown, in the Carolinas, yes? In 1715?” he asked, breathless.

“Of course,” she said slowly, frowning. “Thomas, why—”

“I apologize, Miranda,” he seemed to get a hold of himself, realizing how very mad he’d sounded just then. His smile was back, but it was brittle. “My—brother and I had worked not a day’s ride from there, and still felt it’s affects. It’s silly, as you said, but picturing you being in the middle of all of that is…”

“While your worry is appreciated, it’s not necessary nor was it at the time,” Miranda smiled, motioning at her body. “As you can see, I’m perfectly fine.”

“Yes,” Thomas answered. His smile became less brittle, but his eyes were suspiciously wet. “That you are.”

**~Outskirts of Boston~**

Thomas was not a man given to emotional extremes—not before his wrongful incarceration, and definitely not after. So when James opened the door to their tiny house, his stomach dropped. Thomas stood on their porch, tears rolling down his cheeks but with a face void of any clear emotion; his entire body was trembling.

James carefully guided him inside, shutting the door behind him after glancing over their property suspiciously, as if the very grass could have been responsible. Slowly, he managed to get Thomas into a chair by the fireplace. Thomas still hadn’t looked at him.

“Thomas? Thomas!” James took both of his hands in his own, kneeling down in front of him. “What happened? Does someone suspect our relationship? My identity? Do we need to leave like we did in Savannah?”

The increased panic in James’ voice seemed to shake Thomas out of his stupor. “No,” he grunted softly, then cleared his throat to speak louder. “No, we’re…we’re fine.”

“Then what?” James asked helplessly. He had half a mind to start packing anyway, whatever Thomas assured him about their relative anonymity be damned.

“You know—that is, you are aware…” Thomas shrugged helplessly, closing his eyes. “The woman at Maryse’s shop, that I’ve been enjoying talking to of the books we have.”

“Mrs. Ashe, yes,” James responded. In the back of his mind, he’d wondered idly: _was she a relative of Abigail Ashe’s? Should he write Abigail to inform her that he was not as dead as the rumors would report? Would such news even bring her any joy, or was Captain Flint still in the same category as other fiends in her nightmares?_ He would do nothing, of course, if it turned out if this Mrs. Ashe had hurt Thomas in some way.

Thomas let out a long, shuddering breath, and opened his eyes. He refused to meet James’ though. “My love, I’m so sorry for not bringing my suspicions to you sooner. You saw her—it’s been fifteen years since I’d—her name could have been a coincidence…and it seemed entirely too much good fortune, after all the world has put us through. It’s been so long, and the last time I remember she was bathed in sunlight and covered in the finest silks, and I just…”

“Thomas,” James said, the hard note in his voice completely out of his control. His mind was determinedly trying to put together what was being said, and he was just as determinedly trying to avoid the obvious conclusion. There was no way Thomas meant what James thought he was saying.

He finally met James’ eyes. “Today, she informed me that, five years ago, she woke up in a Charlestown that you saw burned—woke up, and had entirely no memory of how she got there. She was found by a girl that said she was her niece, and told her, her name—Miranda. James—”

“No.” James stood up and began to pace.

“James,” Thomas got up and tried to grab his sleeve, but James moved out of the way.

“No,” James insisted. “What you’re implying is not possible. I—” He recalled vividly, or at least thought he did. He could see blood, soaking into the floor and the dress; he could see the coffin Peter had at least had the decency to put her in. It had been her coffin, right? Peter, in his twisted sense of righteousness, had forbidden the casket from actually being opened.

“ _James_ ,” Thomas stepped directly in front of him. “It’s her. Miranda’s alive.”

 

**Author's Note:**

> “When you arise in the morning think of what a privilege it is to be alive, to think, to enjoy, to love ...” - Meditations


End file.
